Historically, in the field of bullet proofing, armored vehicles used heavy metal plates as protective armor. More recently, wearable bullet resistant materials have been fabricated by long strand fibers, such as weaving Kevlar® or a similar aromatic polyamide (or “Aramid”) fiber into cloth. The cloth is then cut and stitched to construct wearable personal body armor. The cloth is also incorporated into bullet proofing vehicles including military vehicles. The length of the fibers associated with the friction along the length provide the strength.
However, the approaches known in the art suffer a number of drawbacks. For instance, heavy metal plating for armored vehicles undesirably adds to the weight of the vehicle, which reduces the speed of the vehicle, reduces load bearing capability of the vehicle, and increases the maintenance and costs of operating the vehicle. Hence, the conventional methods of armoring a vehicle negatively impact the vehicle's effectiveness in the field, and reduces the useful life of the chassis and drive train components of the vehicle.
Both metal plates and fiber woven cloths are expensive. A typical steel armor plate for Level III threat protection costs about $5000. A 52″ by 63″ Spectra panel costs about $6000. These are only the material costs, and do not include installation costs.
Moreover, the manufacturing processes for forming metal plating and also weaving fibers are complex, costly and time consuming. Further, deploying these conventional materials is non trivial. The conventional materials are difficult to work with, rigid, or unmalleable, and hence, are difficult to implement in tight areas such as the pillars, frame, and doors of a vehicle for example. Accordingly, specific implementations of the conventional armoring techniques often require extensive modifications. For instance, armor for a vehicle door often requires accommodation for the functional latch components of the door.
Further, the conventional methods are severely limited for implementation in potentially high value and/or critical situations, such as for example, during combat and/or at a forward field position. Meanwhile, the need for broader ranging, more cost effective applications of projectile protection grows, for example, with the proliferation of guerilla style and urban attacks. These attacks not only comprise bullets, but also mines, grenades, other explosives, and the like.